Olympic Injustice

Every 4 summers there is a barbaric ritual that occurs involving millions of people from all over the world. It’s happening again this summer in Bejing, China. No, I’m not talking about the Olympics (although it in itself is rather barbaric). I’m talking about the practice of gender testing done on the athletes who are considered “suspect”. This practice has been done since the early 60’s after fear that USSR athletes were really men competing in the women’s divisions so they would have a better chance of winning. 

The actual history of the Olympic gender testing is very disturbing. From forcing the female athletes to parade nude in front of a panel of judges to chromosomal testing to todays standard where the athletes are evaluated by an endocrinologist, gynecologist, a geneticist and a psychologist. One of the more upsetting sides to all this is that since it’s start, gender testing has never led to the disqualification of any athlete. A handful have been found to have been born as intersex. One has had her eligibility revoked and then later reinstated. But no one has been found to be the wolf in sheep’s clothing that everyone was so frenzied over. In fact, the only Olympic athlete to ever be found competing in the “wrong” division was a male German athlete who was forced by the Nazi’s to compete in women’s sports. And that account only came out years later when the athlete disclosed it all himself. 

There is a lot of outcry over the gender testing. There are a lot of people who understand the intricacies of sex and gender and know that there is no black and white. It always surprises me every time the Olympics come around to hear that this practice is still in place. I thought we had evolved more than this. Apparently not.

Attached to the header for this blog entry is a link to the New York Times article on the Olympic gender testing for any who are interested.